Bill Nye's guy: Popular TV show scientist throws support behind President Obama

Thursday

Jul 19, 2012 at 3:15 AMJul 19, 2012 at 2:29 PM

By JIM HADDADINjhaddadin@fosters.com

ROCHESTER — President Barack Obama's re-election campaign is calling attention to public education issues this week with a school bus tour and a visit from children's television host Bill Nye.

Nye, a well-known science educator, visited the Seacoast Science Center in Rye on Monday to discuss President Barack Obama's commitment to science education. He was accompanied by U.S. Congressman Rob Andrews, D-N.J., a ranking member of the House Committee for Education and the Workforce.

Then on Wednesday, the campaign held a bus tour with five stops around the state, including visits to Portsmouth and Rochester.

Obama's New Hampshire campaign organization is in the midst of a two weeklong "Out-Educate" initiative. Volunteers and staffers are emphasizing the president believes education "is a key investment in our future."

Last week, the effort was focused on higher education. The campaign held community college round tables, announced its Young Granite Staters for Obama steering committee and held grassroots phone banks across the state. This week, the campaign is focusing on elementary and secondary school education.

"The president has invested in education, worked to raise K-12 standards, and he has taken steps to make college more affordable so that students from middle-class families can afford the education they need to compete in the global economy," Holly Shulman, communications director for the Obama Campaign in New Hampshire, said in a statement. "What Mitt Romney doesn't seem to understand is that to create true middle-class security, we can't just cut our way to prosperity."

On Monday, Nye and Rep. Andrews hit on the same theme during their visit to the Granite State, which took them to Concord, Manchester and Rye.

Nye, an engineer, comedian, author, and inventor, is best known for playing the part of an energetic science teacher on the television series "Bill Nye the Science Guy," which aired in the mid- to late-1990s.

Nye handled lobsters, signed autographs and promoted the president's re-election bid during his stop on the New Hampshire Seacoast.

"This is the most important election of my life," he said, "and I believe we're at a crossroads — a turning point. We can either move forward, especially in education, or backward. I think voters have a clear choice, so I'm supporting the president."

The campaign has also sought to attack Romney's record on education issues as governor of Massachusetts. Andrews said Romney had the largest cuts, on a per-pupil basis, of any state in the union, resulting in the layoffs of thousands of teachers.

It was teachers themselves who criticized Romney Wednesday during a school bus tour that stopped in Concord, Laconia, Rochester, Portsmouth and Manchester.

A group of more than a dozen educators, including Scott McGilvray, president of the National Education Association in New Hampshire, the union representing school teachers, traveled on the tour.

The bus stopped outside Rochester City Hall at 1:09 p.m., and a group of 15 people emerged, many carrying signs and wearing campaign buttons in support of Obama. A campaign staffer hopped out of the fire exit in the rear of the bus carrying a brown podium, which was positioned on the sidewalk.

Francesca MacMahon, a retired New York school teacher who now lives in Kingston, N.H., was one of four speakers during the afternoon appearance. She highlighted a new proposal advanced by the president on Wednesday morning to invest $1 billion to create an "elite corps of master teachers" focused on science, technology, engineering and math.

"As a former teacher, I believe it was my job to make sure our children were getting all the help they need to succeed, and I believe we need strong teachers who can provide kids with the attention they need to grow and learn," she said.

Meanwhile this week, the Romney campaign focused its energy on attacking the president for "political payoffs to the donor class and layoffs for the middle class." The campaign has sought to highlight questions raised in the media about whether political supporters of the president have been treated favorably or granted stimulus funding.

As part of that effort, the Romney campaign organized a press call with former New Hampshire Gov. John Sununu and small business owners from three states. The campaign also released a video Wednesday titled "Where Did All the Money Go?"

"He showered his friends with stimulus funds and sent millions of taxpayer dollars overseas," the campaign wrote in an announcement about the new ad.

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